OK, going from my foggy old memory Burgess was definitely faster than Lollar. I can remember him hitting the ball hard on the ground and hustling as best he could down to first. I just don't remember him being as slow as maybe I'm supposed to. Smoky wasn't svelte that's for sure. Lollar OTOH made Konerko seem like a track star.

OK, going from my foggy old memory Burgess was definitely faster than Lollar. I can remember him hitting the ball hard on the ground and hustling as best he could down to first. I just don't remember him being as slow as maybe I'm supposed to. Smoky wasn't svelte that's for sure. Lollar OTOH made Konerko seem like a track star.

Yep, dovetails with my memory--Lollar was about as mobile as the Prudential Building...

Smoky was able to extend his career to age 40 by being a specialist who was a fan favorite when he was called on. I think he's still up there in career pinch hits. Probably because of long minutes on the bench and his age, it was fun to watch his warm up routine in the on deck circle before pinch hitting, eventually windmilling double bats/iron rod. He would get his hit, then taken out to cheers for a pinch runner like Al Weis. I don't ever recall him actually behind the plate the few times he was, but his role was clear and needed by their lack of hitting depth (I recall the team needing to use Gary Peters as a pinch hitter). Too bad he didn't get a ring in 1964 or 1967, but he sure was special.

Switch-hitter Al Weis broke into the big leagues with the White Sox in 1962 and would play for 10 seasons. Never a regular, the most games he ever started in a season was 83 for the ’64 Sox. A career utility player, he played second base, third base, shortstop, and the outfield during his career. He would never break the .300 mark for batting average, although he did come close in 1965 with a .296 mark. finishing with only a .219 average. He would never hit for more than two home runs or 23 RBI in a season, finishing with seven and 115 for his career, respectively. The White Sox traded him to the Mets following the 1967 season, where he would finish his career. Certainly the highlight of his career came in October 1969 as a member of the Mets’ World Series-winning squad. Interestingly, although he had only one plate appearance in three games during the NLCS against the Braves, he had 16 plate appearances in five games during the World Series. He made the most of the Series, batting .455 and knocking in three runs, including a solo home run that tied the game in the bottom of the 7th of the eventual series-clinching game five.

Other than having the highest batting average of his career, Weis’s 1965 season was fairly typical. He appeared in many more games (85) than he started (37), seeing time at second, third, shortstop, and centerfield. Despite the high average, he had fewer at bats than the two previous years or the next year, stepping up to the plate 156 times. He would score 29 times and drive in 12 runs. Eight of his 40 hits were for extra bases; his only home run of the season came on May 7th, 1965.

The White Sox didn’t play on May 6th, so the May 7th game was the first since Burgess had driven in the tying and go-ahead run with his pinch-hit single on the 5th. It was the first game of a three-game series against the Twins, the second series the two teams had played in 1965. The Twins had taken the first series two games to one but, having lost the day before, entered the game 1.5 behind the White Sox. It looked bad for the White Sox in the first inning when Harmon Killebrew hit one of his 573 career homers with two men on. But Al Weis would get the Sox back in the game with a two-run, two-out double in the 2nd inning, scoring Pete Ward and Ron Hansen. Tommy John retired the next six Twins he faced, and Hansen tied the game with a solo home run in the top of the 4th. After Ken Berry flied out to left field, Weis came up again with two outs. His solo home run was his only of the season, put the Sox ahead, and knocked Twins pitcher Dick Stigman out of the game early. The Sox would go on to score nine more runs and win 13-5. Don Buford eventually pinch-hit for Weis in the 7th, even though his performance was by far his most productive of the season.

With the win, the White Sox had won five in a row and moved to 2.5 games ahead of the Twins. A child thumbing through his White Sox cards on May 7th may have been encouraged about his own ability to be a major league player when he came to Weis’s card. With a youthful face and a slender frame, the average American young man might have seen a little of himself in Al Weis.

Met Al a few years ago at Hunters Ridge Golf Club in Bonita Springs Fl where I was a part time Desk Jockey. We talked quite a bit about the White Sox of that era, he gave me a signed baseball card from the 67 season.

PS Joe Pignatano who caught for the Dodgers was a member at Hunters Ridge and always gave me the needle about the Bums beating us in the 59 Series.

Three eventual Hall-of-Famers would have rookie cards in the 1965 Topps set: Steve Carlton, Joe Morgan, and Jim “Catfish” Hunter. So Greg Bollo was in good company when his name and likeness appeared on a rookie card that season. Signed by the White Sox as an amateur before the 1964 season, Bollo put together a 12-7 record with a 2.46 ERA in A-ball during his first professional season. He made his major-league debut the next season, on May 9th, 1965. It was mop-up duty, but Bollo made the most of his debut, pitching 2 perfect innings in a 6-1 White Sox loss to the Twins. And it wasn’t an easy assignment, either. The first two batters he faced were Tony Oliva and Harmon Killebrew, who flew out to left and grounded out to shortstop, respectively. Having lost the day before as well, the White Sox had seen a 2.5-game lead dwindle to a .5-game lead by the end of the day.

Bollo’s debut on May 9th was indicative of how he was used during what would turn out to be a brief career. In 15 appearances during the ’65 season, Bollo entered the game with the White Sox losing in all but one. On June 28th, Bollo was called upon to protect a 4-3 lead in the bottom of the 5th. Although he retired the first two batters, he then gave up a solo home run to Jimmie Hall and was promptly taken out of the game in favor of Eddie Fisher. Although Bollo would have a 2.20 ERA as late in the season as July 24th, he finished the season with a 3.57 ERA in 22.2 innings pitched, third highest among a talented batch of 1965 White Sox pitchers. Bollo would appear in three games as a late-season call-up in 1966, but never reached the big leagues again, retiring after the 1970 season.

A discerning child in 1965 might have chuckled at Topps’ rudimentary “photoshop” capabilities. The cap on Bollo’s head is clearly set high and to the right. It’s not surprising that Topps didn’t have a photo of Bollo in a White Sox uniform; he had never put on one until a few months after the cards were printed.

Floyd Robinson was one of the White Sox most productive hitters during the early 1960s. He got his first chance as a starter in 1961, and his .310 average, 11 homers, and 59 RBI earned him third place in Rookie of the Year voting. He would go on to receive MVP votes each of the next four seasons, with his 1962 sophomore season by far the best of his career. That year he set career highs in average (.312), RBI (109), and total bases (285), and led the entire league in doubles with 45. He led the White sox in average three out of four years between 1961 and 1964, and 1965 was his last season of significant productivity. He started seeing less playing time in 1966 and after the ’66 season was traded to the Reds for pitcher Jim O’Toole. He would bounce between the Reds, Red Sox, and Athletics for two seasons before retiring after the 1968 season. Robinson’s .287 batting average with the White Sox is good 22nd on the White Sox all-time list, and his 875 hits and 400 RBI are good for 32nd and 34th, respectively.

Complementing Pete Ward as the only other pure lefty in the White Sox regular 1965 lineup, Al Lopez generally put Robinson first, second, or third in the batting order. He started 146 games in 1965, all but eight in right field. Robinson got off to somewhat of a slow start to the season, batting only .226 after the first game of a doubleheader on May 31st. But Robinson would never be pulled from the starting lineup, and finished the season with a .265 average. His 66 RBI tied him with Ron Hansen for second on the team, behind Bill Skowron’s team-leading 78. His RBI seemed to come in bunches; in 1965 he had three or more RBI seven times. Hansen and Skowron accomplished the feat a total of seven times between them. One of Robinson’s high-octane games came on May 17th.

On May 10th, the White Sox had lost the last of a four-game series with the Twins. Finishing the series with only one win, the Twins had taken a half-game lead over the White Sox. Since the 10th, however, the Sox had won seven straight, including sweeping two doubleheaders. They entered the game on the 17th with a 2.5 game lead over the Twins, and got off to a quick start. Cater lead off the game with a triple, scored on a wild pitch, Buford doubled, and Floyd Robinson smacked a two-run homer off Athletics starter Rollie Sheldon. With Ron Hansen single later in the inning, and the White Sox had batted for the cycle and taken a 3-0 lead in the first inning. Robinson would get out the next two times at the plate, but singled twice late in the game, adding another RBI and two more runs. By the end of the night, the Sox had plated 13 runs and Robinson had three hits, three RBI, and three runs. The White Sox took a 3.5-game lead as they won their 8th straight while the Twins lost in 10 innings to the California Angels.

If a child had run across the actual card pictured above in 1965, he must have put it away in a safe place. Of 144 examples graded by Professional Sports Authenticator, 20 have received the same Mint grade and none have received the coveted grade of Gem Mint.